“Anybody who was tied to leadership had that stigma,” Weber said. The two holdouts were among only nine Republicans to vote for Webster. Ryan hauled in 236 votes. He needed 218 to win, but wanted a unanimous 247 votes from House Republicans, running as the conference's “unity candidate.”

Ryan won over a majority of the Freedom Caucus but fell short of an endorsement. The Texas delegation pledged their support to Ryan, despite Weber and Gohmert’s resistance.

“The group reached a ‘consensus’ but two of us made commitments to Dan we will keep,” Gohmert said, in a written statement.

But after losing the Republican conference's internal vote Wednesday, Webster asked his remaining supporters not to vote for him on the floor. That didn’t sway Weber or Gohmert, who did not agree with Ryan’s various conditions to take the job.

“I simply cannot vote for a candidate who demands more power before he agrees to be speaker,” Gohmert said in a statement. “I am a man of my word.”

Heath Rep. John Ratcliffe, who had held out hope for a speaker bid from South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy, came around to voting for Ryan.

“He is saying ‘let’s start over, with a clean slate for everyone,'" Ratcliffe said. "This is an opportunity for a unified conference, through regular order and a bottom up approach, giving all members the opportunity to move legislation.”

Although his pick didn’t become speaker, Weber said the change in speaker has a precedent for how representatives can stand up to leadership.

“I told Paul once he became quarterback I would be 110 percent behind him, after voting for Webster on the floor, and I will be,” Weber said. “But if we have a suspicion that there is a problem, there will be a group that now feels strong enough to stand up and say ‘If you think something is wrong, it is okay to speak out."